1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates, in general, to green tea-based cigarettes and a method for manufacturing the same. More particularly, the present invention relates to green tea based cigarettes made from green tea leaves in combination with tobacco leaves or cinnamon, which provide tastes and flavors similar to those of conventional tobacco, or novel mild and fresh tastes and flavors, to smokers, with little or no toxicity thanks to the neutralization effects of the advantageous green tea ingredients epigallocatechin gallate(EGCG), flavonoids, catechin, etc.
2. Description of the Related Art
With the progress of society to complexity, it is likely for people to encounter greater stress. People try to pursue new activities and substances to cope with stress. Since 1492, tobacco has been one of the favorite substances of people all over the world, playing a role as one of the coping mechanisms. With almost all persistent flavors determined mainly by its leaves, tobacco, however, contains as many as 4,000 kinds of toxic materials, particularly, nicotine and tar, which are known to be responsible for a variety of serious diseases in smokers. In spite of such serious harmfulness, governments of countries do not actively conduct campaigns against smoking due to the enormous tax revenue from tobacco, and smoking is a very difficult habit to break because of the powerful nicotine addiction. Thus, smokers are always in great peril from disease. In addition, the tobacco smoke that smokers blow from their cigarettes is known to cause the same serious diseases in non-smokers inhaling the smoke as in the smokers.
A puff of tobacco smoke that is absorbed into the body from the respiratory organ of a smoker contains a lot of small toxic particles consisting mainly of nicotine, tar, and carbon monoxide.
Nicotine, a representative toxic substance contained in cigarettes, is a colorless oily compound, an alkaloid found naturally throughout the tobacco plant, with a high concentration in the leaves. Nicotine is toxic enough to kill persons who intake its concentrated aqueous solution. Nicotine in each puff of inhaled tobacco smoke is rapidly absorbed through the lungs and delivered to the brain within seconds. The nicotine in a puff of tobacco smoke is absorbed into the body in an amount of 20-30 wt % based on the total weight of the nicotine if the smoke puff remains only within the mouth and in an amount of 70 wt % or higher if the smoke puff is inhaled into the lungs. Acting as a factor leading to the pleasant and habit-forming qualities of tobacco smoking, nicotine is pharmaceutically classified as an addictive drug of almost the same level as opium. Causing unpleasant withdrawal symptoms, nicotine leads to smoking every 30 to 40 min once smokers start smoking. In addition, nicotine has the pharmaceutical effect of stimulating the central nervous system, like amphetamine. However, nicotine and amphetamine, although both are light stimulants, cause various stimulation effects. For example, when inhaled, nicotine increases the resting heart rate by 15-20 beats/min, as well as blood pressure, causes faster breathing, and contracts blood vessels so that frequent blood pumping is required. Consequently, nicotine brings about serious problems in the cardiovascular system.
Tar is the resinous partially combusted particulate matter produced by the burning of tobacco in the act of smoking. Tar partially determines the characteristic flavors of cigarettes, and appears as a blackish brown substance when a puff of tobacco smoke is blown against white paper. Tar is purportedly the most destructive component in habitual tobacco smoking, accumulating in the smoker's lungs over time and damaging them through various biochemical and mechanical processes. Tar includes the majority of mutagenic and carcinogenic agents in tobacco smoke.
Carbon monoxide is also produced upon smoking and is a colorless, odorless gas, like exhaust gas from automobiles. Thus, a smoking person is like a person breathing fossil fuel exhaust. Carbon monoxide reduces the blood's ability to carry oxygen, causing smokers to suffer from chronic hypoxemia and symptoms of senility. The headache, dizziness and difficult breathing syndromes occurring when a person smokes heavily or stays for a long period of time in a space filled with tobacco smoke, are believed to result from the interruption of the blood's oxygen supply function by carbon monoxide.
Further, tobacco leaves packed within cigarette paper produce as many as about 4,000 toxic substances when burned at 800° C.
Conventionally, cigarettes are produced by cutting well dried tobacco leaves into thin strands, applying at least one of 599 spices to the cut tobacco leaves, wrapping cigarette paper around the tobacco in a machine, cutting the whole rod into lengths of 85-120 mm, making a cigarette rod, inserting a filter into the cigarette rod, and then wrapping tipping paper around the assembly.
As described above, conventional cigarettes made from tobacco plants produces about 4,000 toxic substances, including nicotine and many carcinogens, upon burning at about 800° C. when smoking. Also, smoking damages non-smokers around smokers in addition to the smokers themselves. In fact, the smoke that is inhaled by smokers is filtered to some degree through the filter attached to the cigarette, but the persons around smoking persons, even though they are non-smokers, are damaged more seriously because they inhale smoke which is not filtered, but generated directly from the burning portion of the cigarette.
Statistically, non-smokers have a 30% higher incidence of lung cancer and a 50% higher incidence of heart disease due to passive smoking than do their spouses who smoke. Their children are likely to suffer from acute respiratory diseases with a 5.7-fold higher incidence and from lung cancer with a 2-fold higher incidence than are the smokers. In addition to spoiling indoor air, tobacco smoke makes clothes smell disgusting.
Therefore, there is an imperative need for cigarettes that avoid the problems encountered in the prior arts and provide mild and fresh flavors and tastes to the smokers, with little or almost no bad effects of their smoke on the health of the smokers as well as that of secondhand smokers.